AN: All publicly recognised characters are the sole owner of their creator, Stephenie Meyer, who is in no way affiliated with this piece of literary fiction. No copyright infringment is intended.

So I've been working on this story for a while now, and it's finally ready to be seen by the world. It's the only story I've actually had beta'd, and it's my favourite by far.

This is the beginning to a 4 chapter (5 chapters including prologue) story.

I sincerely hope you enjoy it.

A Love Story For The Ages

a Twilight fanfiction by missrebecca

Prologue

On a midsummer night, the streets were silent as Chicago's inhabitants lay dead, dying or praying. The city was in shock; no one expected the pandemic to reach so far. Not their large, modern city. They'd heard the reports from neighbouring states; it was just as bad everywhere else. So no one was around to notice the lone girl in her night dress stumbling along the deserted streets, flitting in and out of street lights, and tumbling down back alleys.

The wind on her face was warm as she walked quickly to the hospital to see her love. He'd taken ill only the week before, but she knew the doctors didn't hold much hope. His mother had died the day before, and she'd held him as she'd cried, her love too fervent to understand what was happening.

The summer breeze whipped her long hair into her eyes where it had come loose from her braid. It was late, getting on for ten o clock at night, and really she should be at home. Her father would kill her if he knew she was out this late. But she had to see him, she wasn't even sure why, except there was a pressure in her chest and a pain she didn't know the cause of, pushing her to see him.

She ran down another filthy alley when the pain hit again. Like burning from the inside out, but she ran through it, though it made her delirious and blind. She needed to see him, to hold him, for what she thought might be the last time, for surely this fire would kill her.

She couldn't describe this need, this urge to see her love. Though she knew he was burning as she was, though she knew not how she could. It was like needles, red hot needles poking at her skin from the inside, but no amount of ice would cool it. It had been the same for seven hours now. At first it had itched, an itching so bad she couldn't stand it. At first she'd used her nails to scratch the pain away, then she'd used forks and pens, till her arms were covered in blood but the itching had turned to a fire and the fire wouldn't go away. She didn't scream as she bled, as she burned. She was quiet through dinner as the panic ran through her gut, telling her to find him, to hold him.

Eventually her legs would work no more. The brick was cold and soothing to her hot skin as she collapsed against the wall, silent sobs escaping her throat. She needed to see him, to feel him one last time, without the presence of chaperones or doctors. They were to be married in a month, but she wasn't so sure it would happen. How could she survive this pain?

She didn't feel the ground as she fell to it. The fire had spread through all her limbs now, making her heart race and her muscles ache. She'd never felt her heart beat so fast.

And as she collapsed completely, her face meeting the ground she thought of her love; of Edward, as the fire consumed and stopped her heart.